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1.2.4-Pilferingapples
Brick!club Book I Fantine Book 2 Ch. 4 In Which The Bishop Is Still Slightly More Subtle Than Hugo, or, It’s A Good Thing I Am Personally Fascinated By Agriculture Or, oh no, Hugo, please not the epistolary format again. PLEASE. Because as much as I like hearing about the dairies (and readers of this blog are advised to remember that I am in fact a tremendous hick, though here it’s beef and not dairy and wow, digressions must be contagious, moving on now), it stretches my disbelief JUST A TAD that Baptistine is tell her friends about it. The Bishop is clearly driving home a point— he wants Valjean to remember the grurin jobs, and ask after them, maybe even ask the specifically-named family of the Bishop—but Baptistine is presumably not trying to convince her friends to apply for dairy jobs, so why the detail? Weird language in this chapter too- the emphasis (in both my translations) on the dairies being PATRIARCHAL— which matters why? Does that mean that it would be easier to get a job there? Is it unusual in France at this point for dairies to be run by guys? TELL ME MORE ABOUT THE DAIRIES, HUGO. I know you have it in you! And random translation-version disagreement— the skin Baptistine loans to Valjean’s bed is a roebuck in the FMA, a goat in the Denny. That…that is not the same thing. What’s the original description? At any rate, look, it’s so old it’s shedding hairs! Bishop, buddy, you’re having problems with moderation again. It’s ok to have…blankets. You can’t share what you don’t have, if nothing else! BUY NEW BLANKETS TO SHARE WITH VISITORS. Aside from that, love the discussion of “true evangelism”— I’ve heard good manners described as making people comfortable, regardless of rules or setting, and I think it’s sort of drawing on the same thing. Especially if, like the Bishop, you’re going to be hammering on the Love One Another part of the lesson, it’s probably sort of important to put it in play. The epistolary thing, though. Hugo. No. Commentary Gascon-en-exile Forget the dairy details - why would Baptistine’s friend care about this dinner with a random stranger, especially considering the far more dramatic events that are soon to occur? I realize that suspension of disbelief needs to be stronger in an epistolary style because of the presence of a fictional intermediary recipient, but…yeah, leave this to people like Laclos, Hugo (and, by the way, I love Les Liaisons dangereuses and regret that I have almost no opportunity to talk about it online). The skin they give to Valjean is that of a chevreuil, a roe deer. Denny might have gotten it mixed up with chèvre, the word for goat and a more familiar word to people (like myself) not too knowledgeable about game animals and the like. I don’t even know what a “roe” deer is - a particular species? As for the patriachal nature of the dairies, my guess is that the bishop is emphasizing that these are family-run businesses (from father to son, i.e. patriachal, or technically patrilineal but close enough). That would contrast with the beginning of that paragraph, that “''en 93 on n’avait plus de parents, on n’avait que ses bras''" ("in ‘93 one no longer had any relatives; one had only one’s arms" (figurative, like "every man for himself")). The bishop is praising these businesses for maintaining family ties in the face of the massive civil strife that went on during the Revolution and immediately after. The likely conclusion is that he believes these dairies to be more compassionate and perhaps more charitable, since "family values" is a nice feel-good sentiment when it’s not being weaponized against gay marriage or something. There, I think I’ve atoned for all the X-rated bathroom conversation. Drinkwithgrantaire (reply to Gascon-en-exile) Interesting about the varying translations. Mine simply says deerskin. Anyway, so I googled, and apparently the roe deer IS a specific species found commonly in Western Europe, and it’s also known for being a rather small deer with a shoulder height of 65–75 cm (2.1–2.5 ft), and a weight of 15–35 kg (33–77 lb)- quite small indeed! Just in case anybody was wondering. =)